The European patent with unitary effect (hereafter unitary patent) and the Unified Patent Court are two separate but related proposals to make patents cheaper, litigation more profitable, and possibly install a complete court system with a pro-patent bias.

The unitary patent is an EU proposal, based on EU regulations 1257/2012 and 1260/2012.

The Unified Patent Court is an international agreement. The parties are all EU members states but the agreement does not involve the EU.

Most of the involved countries are members of both agreements.

The Unified Patent Court is still waiting to be ratified by the agreeing member states. The unitary patent will only come into force after the Unified Patent Court does. The two regulations which enable the unitary patent are also the subject to actions on annulation introduced by Spain before the EU Court of Justice. The case is pending.

The new court may also have a pro-patent bias and thus increase the risk of software patents becoming enforceable. Unitary patents will only be officially published in one language: either English or French or German. Speakers of other languages have increased risk of inadvertent infringement and increased costs of patent clearance searches.

This proposal took over from the Community Patent since the Lisbon Treaty and is often called the EU patent.[1][2] The term "European patent" refers to the system in place since 1973. A unitary patent is a type of European patent. The EPO must first grant the European patent, and then the applicant can request that it be given unitary effect.

As of February 2014, the unitary patent has been rejected by Spain and Italy. The Unified Patent Court has been rejected by Croatia (who wasn't a member when it was signed), Poland, and Spain.

According to European Commissioner Charlie McCreevy, May 18th 2006, the Community Patent would give the EU Court of Justice authority in interpreting the EPC:

an important feature of the proposed Community patent system is the accession of the Community to the EPC. By this, the convention becomes part of the Community acquis and subject to interpretation by the European Court of Justice (ECJ). The ECJ is not bound by the case law developed by the EPO and is free in its interpretation of the provisions of the EPC[6]

By creating a court with patent lawyers as judges, this proposal will lead to a set of rulings in favour of expanding patent law (giving a "maximal" interpretation of the law). This is how software patents came into existence in the USA via the creation of the CAFC in 1982.

Even if the European Court of Justice would have jurisdiction to review the new court's rulings, we might see the principle of settled expectations causing the European Court of Justice to follow the new court.